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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28785237">Sound and Color</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/CenturyUnited/pseuds/CenturyUnited'>CenturyUnited</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Who (2005)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, anyway twelve is a master thief of art, bc life gets in the way of fun things sometimes, thats it, thats the whole plot, this will be very slowly written</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:41:55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,278</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28785237</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/CenturyUnited/pseuds/CenturyUnited</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>This is just going to be some stupid fun.</p><p>Twelve is a professional art thief, and Clara happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The police get involved, tom-foolery ensues, and love will inevitably follow. (Because with these two, how could that ever be avoided?)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Twelfth Doctor/Clara Oswin Oswald</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Sound and Color</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This will likely be a very slowly updated story. Feel free to stick around and throw me some feedback or a hello or any suggestions for things you'd like to see. I have loads of ideas and have certain things that I'm set on incorporating, but I'm generally happy to turn this story into whatever people would genuinely enjoy. :-)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As she watches a small puddle form under the dripping umbrella that rests by her feet, Clara tries her best to reasonably calculate whether or not she’s about to be arrested.</p><p>Sure, she may have potentially done some <em> light </em> trespassing when she attended some posh party as a plus-one last weekend, but she couldn’t be held entirely responsible for her wandering. Her date was painfully boring, the wealthy party-goers put her on edge, and the extravagant home at which the party was being hosted was practically <em> begging </em> to be explored.</p><p>And yes, maybe she spent a little extra time in a room that was tragically far from the party’s ‘designated area’, but she could hardly be blamed. There had been a <em> real</em>, authentic Degas hanging on the wall, and she’d just wanted to admire it. Clara was sure that even the police had to understand a little off-limits lingering for the sake of appreciating rare art. Plus, it’s not like she broke anything. (And she hadn’t been the only one who’d gone into that room to look at the painting, anyway. She distinctly remembers a gray-haired man wandering in some time after she did).</p><p>Nevertheless, Clara can’t discount the fact that she’s currently sitting in a central London police station because she was asked to come in and ‘answer a few questions’.</p><p>As she takes a good look around—her gaze inevitably returning to the blue Metropolitan Police logo stuck on the wall in front of her—she puts her odds for arrest at roughly thirty-five percent. (Which is a random number mostly, since she’s an English teacher and very much not a statistician).</p><p>“Miss Oswald?” A woman with thick-framed glasses and dark hair comes to a stop in front of her chair. “Follow me, please. We’re just back here.”</p><p>Grabbing her umbrella, Clara stands and follows the officer into what appears to be one of those dreary interrogation rooms where a blonde woman in an official-looking pantsuit is already waiting. (This bodes poorly for her made-up arrest statistics). Moving fully into the room, she takes a hard, metal seat and braces herself.</p><p>“Right, let’s start with the basics,” says the blonde woman. “I’m Deputy Commissioner Lethbridge-Stewart, and this is my colleague Detective Sergeant Osgood. Do you know why you’re here, Miss Oswald?”</p><p>“Er, not really. Should I?” Clara attempts a friendly smile but is met with a serious countenance and a heavy silence. She awkwardly clears her throat.</p><p>“We’ll just have to enlighten you then.” The Deputy Commissioner drags a folder that had been sitting at the edge of the table towards herself. She pulls out a picture and turns it towards Clara. “Do you recognize this?”</p><p>Clara’s brow furrows. It’s a picture of the Degas she’d admired while potentially trespassing. “Yes. I saw the painting while I was at a party last Saturday.”</p><p>“Good. Did you know that the family who owns this painting kept it as one of their biggest secrets? Only a handful of people outside of their own flesh and blood even knew of its existence.”</p><p>“Oh?” Clara’s not entirely certain where this line of inquiry is headed. Yes, maybe it proves that she was somewhere she shouldn’t have been, but nothing more than that. She doesn’t understand why everyone is being so serious.</p><p>“We talked to your date from that night, Miss Oswald. He told us that you curiously disappeared only twenty minutes after arriving at the party and that you were gone for hours. Care to explain?”</p><p>“Boredom?” she answers with a chuckle. Both women stare gravely at her, unshaken. She swallows. “Okay, yes. Yes. I wandered off. But I was just curious! And he was <em> really </em> boring. It’s not like I hurt anyone.”</p><p>“Well, boredom might be enough to motivate you Miss Oswald, but it’s not an acceptable excuse for theft in the eyes of the law.”</p><p>The air is suddenly sucked right out the room. The absolute absurdity of the accusation chokes Clara, and she can’t manage to form a response.</p><p>“You see, Miss Oswald, we’ve been following your work for months.” As she speaks, DC Lethbridge-Stewart pulls out more pictures of beautiful paintings from the folder that sits between them. “The mysterious disappearances and reappearances of priceless works of art all across the city have been both interesting and incredibly irritating.”</p><p>Clara’s brow furrows in even greater confusion. “No. No, I—, I’m not—, I’ve never—”</p><p>“I must hand it to you,” says the blonde woman, cutting her off. “Until this most recent theft, we had next to nothing on you as far as evidence goes. No camera footage, no witnesses, no paper trail. Fortunately for us, everyone has to slip up at some point. Even you. And, honestly, lifting the Degas in the middle of a party? A little sloppy, if I may say so.”</p><p>She’s startled out of her shocked silence by the mention of the Degas. “Wait a minute, someone stole the <em> painting? </em> You brought me here because you think <em> I </em> stole that painting?! I thought I was here to be charged with trespassing or something, not with masterminding some lucrative heist! That’s ridiculous!”</p><p>“Miss Oswald, really. There is no point in pretending that you don’t know exactly what we’re talking about.”</p><p>Clara feels like she might be in a strange nightmare. “But I <em>actually</em> <em>don’t</em> <em>know</em> what you’re on about. I stumbled on the painting by accident, and I only ditched the party because it was so boring. I didn’t <em>steal</em> anything!”</p><p>“All of our current evidence points to you, Miss Oswald. If it wasn’t you, then who was it?”</p><p>Clara wracks her brain for something to say when she’s struck with the sudden realization and the painful certainty that the police are missing vital information and that they’re not going to believe her when she gives it to them. She decides to try anyway.</p><p>“You don’t know the whole story. There was a man who came into that room while I was sitting in there.”</p><p>“How convenient.” DC Lethbridge-Stewart gives her a look that says ‘<em>I’ve heard this before</em>’.</p><p>“No, I swear! He was tall and gangly and had gray hair. I remember him because of his bloody Wayfarers. It was nighttime, and we were indoors, and I couldn’t understand the point of wearing sunglasses.”</p><p>DS Osgood jumps in for the first time since they entered the room. “Do you have anything at all that proves this man was there? A picture? The name of anyone else who saw him?”</p><p>“No,” Clara answers with a wince. She knows how this all sounds, but it’s true. “He started mumbling to himself, and I decided to leave before he noticed me. I didn’t want to get caught trespassing.”</p><p>“Of course,” DC Lethbridge-Stewart says, voice filled to the brim with irony. “Well, I’m afraid your tale of a mystery man isn’t enough to get you out of here today. We can’t formally charge you until we find more proof, but we can hold you here for twenty-four hours while we try to find it.”</p><p>Clara sighs at the finality of it. She’d never been one for following all the rules, but never in her wildest dreams did she ever imagine that she’d end up in this frankly insane situation. She only barely resists the urge to pinch herself.</p><p>DC Lethbridge-Stewart stands to leave the room. “DS Osgood is going to ask you a few more questions about your whereabouts on the nights of the previous thefts. If you’re as innocent as you say you are, surely one of your alibis will check out.”</p><p>As the door to the tiny room closes behind the Deputy Commissioner, Clara looks down at her now-dry umbrella. While she desperately hopes that at least one of the nights in question involved a parents evening at school or one of her regular hook-ups or literally <em> anything </em> that didn’t involve her reading a book in her flat by herself, she realistically adds a solid forty percent to her mostly-made-up odds for arrest.</p><p>It’s going to be a long twenty-four hours.</p><p>---</p><p> </p><p>The air smells like grease, vinegar, and potatoes. Some people might find the scent nauseating given how strong it is, but Clara has always found it comforting. She loves the whole experience of being in a chippy.</p><p>It’s a Friday night nearing the end of September, and it’s only been two days since she was released from her temporary holding cell. She’d considered going on another date to pass the time, but after her horrifically long week—which included an unfortunate conversation with Mr. Armitage about having to miss work due to being held in a police station—she just wanted chips and inexpensive wine.</p><p>And that’s how she’s ended up at her local chippy, waiting for her regular order. (Oliver, the boy who works chips on Friday nights, insisted that she wait for a fresh batch, and she certainly wasn’t one to argue with steaming hot chips). It’s still early, so the drunkards and party-goers haven’t taken over the tiny seating area yet. The wait is oddly peaceful.</p><p>Once Clara has her bag of chips, properly soaked through by grease and malt vinegar, she begins to make the trek back to her flat. It’s chilly, but it’s the kind of chill that Clara enjoys. It makes the bag of chips in her hands feel just that much hotter, and it fills her lungs with air that feels crisp.</p><p>She’s just reached into her greasy paper bag and grabbed a steaming hot chip, relishing the moment and letting her mouth water before she properly pops it into her mouth, when her moment of peace is rudely interrupted by someone who knocks into her from behind.</p><p>The first chip of the bag lies sadly at her feet, and Clara can’t look away from it. Her brain can't quite fathom how it went from almost landing between her teeth to being on the cold ground, and she’s now unreasonably upset at having lost the chip that she’d been savoring since she first left her flat. Her week was so absolutely abysmal that she fears she might even start crying at the loss of this one stupid (but delicious) thing. She sniffles.</p><p>“Oh no,” says an altogether unfamiliar voice. “You’re not crying, are you? I’m against crying.”</p><p>Clara turns violently towards the voice as she practically yells, “Who asked y—”</p><p>When her gaze settles on the person who caused her to drop her chip, Clara’s whole face contorts in fury.</p><p>“You. <em>You</em>. You’re the one that— It’s you!”  There’s so much that she wants to say to this man, this <em>criminal</em> who caused her to spend an entire day held in a cell, that she’s tripping over her own words. Her mouth continues opening and closing in mute reprimand.</p><p>The man’s confused and frustrated frown is clearly discernible despite the fact that he’s still wearing his stupid Wayfarers in the middle of the bloody night. His mouth forms an annoying pout. “Of course I’m me! Who are <em> you?</em>”</p><p>She’d been about to ask him if he was following her, but his evident confusion about who she even is makes it clear that he wasn't. It doesn’t make her any less angry. “I’m the woman who spent almost twenty-four miserable hours in a Metropolitan Police holding cell for a crime that I’m almost certain <em>you</em> committed at a party last weekend.”</p><p>The man’s frown, in defiance of all physical rules pertaining to facial expressions, somehow intensifies. “No. I would have noticed your presence. Did you know that you reek of frying oil and vinegar? You’re like a walking chip shop. A miniature walking chip shop, if my estimates are correct.”</p><p>“I smell like that because I just came from a chippy, you arse. Hence the chips?” She waves her bag around and realizes, with no small hint of sadness, that they’re only warm now. “Which you’ve officially ruined, by the way.”</p><p>He doesn’t turn to look towards her waving chips, his gaze remaining steady on some point above her right shoulder, but he continues frowning.</p><p>“I didn’t touch your chips,” he says, petulantly.</p><p>“No, but you made me drop one, and now the rest of them aren’t even hot anymore.” A moment passes, and then it dawns on Clara that they’re currently talking about bloody chips instead of the fact that he’s some sort of mastermind thief. She shakes her head. “Anyway, that’s not important right now. What’s important is that you’re a criminal, and I’m going to turn you into the police.”</p><p>At hearing her statement, he smirks. (It’s infuriating). “How do you plan to do that?”</p><p>“I could call them right now,” she threatens. “Or I could take a picture of you, and go back to the station, and show them that I wasn’t lying when I said that I saw you at that party. That I didn’t just make you up.”</p><p>“No one knows I was there. There’s no proof that I was ever anywhere near that painting.”</p><p>Clara frowns. “But you’re admitting it to me right now. <em> I </em> know you were there.”</p><p>“Yes, yes, yes, but you have no <em> proof</em>.” He waves his hands animatedly, like <em> he’s </em> the one that should be frustrated with <em> her </em> for not understanding the finer details of police investigations. “Besides, even if you took a picture of me to prove that I was real, they would never believe that I was the culprit. Not once they looked into me."</p><p>She hates that he sounds so absolutely certain of the whole situation. “Oh no? And why is that?”</p><p>“Because,” and he gives her a full, cheeky grin now. “I’m blind.”</p>
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